Where we had camped was relatively close to Baquedano and we continued on the road into the town.\u00a0 In the town itself there was a small museum which contained a really fascinating collection of antiquities.\u00a0 I don\u00b4t really know how to describe it actually, there were things collected from the old mine houses with row upon rom of bottles, shoes, horse-shoes and the like all covered in a reassuringly thich layer of dust.\u00a0 Also in the town was the old station, although we struggled to find it for a little while.\u00a0 The place was amazing with a vast collection of old steam engines and carriages.\u00a0 It was a photographer\u00b4s paradise with light streaming through gaps in old iron enginery.<\/p>\n
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From Baquedano we headed to Chacabuco, a disused mining town more recently used as a prison.\u00a0 According to several guides it was a place where you were able to see what an old mining town looked like and see the art drawn on the walls from when the place was later used as a prison.\u00a0 Unfortunately what none of the guides told us was that it was closed!\u00a0 So we headed off and Dad found another old mining town on the map.\u00a0 The old nitrate (saltpetre) town was fascinating with almost a Pompei typw feel to it.\u00a0 The buildings were crumbling but intact enough to get the feel of the place down to painted decorations inside some of the house\u00b4s rooms.<\/p>\n
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We continued down Route 5 and then left the main road and headed through the mountains.\u00a0 I keep saying how amazing the scenery and driving throgh Chile is but it really was.\u00a0 We didn\u00b4t really realise how high up we were until we got towards the coast and had the most fantastic vista down both ways out across the Pacific.\u00a0 The coastal road down to Taltal was fantastic and there was little of the typical Chilean coastal fog so there were spectacular views out to the ocean.<\/p>\n
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When we arrived at Taltal we headed to a set of Cabanas that I had seen an advert for in the guidebook.\u00a0 At the office we were, somewhat unconvincingly, told that they were all fully booked until the following year!\u00a0 So we heeaded further into town, via a rather uninspiring campsite.\u00a0 In the town itself we found a seafront hosteleria which was very reasonable and in the most fantastic location.\u00a0 We settled in and then went for dinner in the restaurant.\u00a0 The seafood was absolutely out of this World and, as always in Chile, the wine was lovely.\u00a0 We started with aperetifs which, again as always in Chile, were very strong.\u00a0 If you buy a spirit here it\u00b4s not like buying a drink in England where someone carefully measures twenty five millilitres into your glass before drowning it in a mixture.\u00a0 In Chile they liberally pour whichever spirit into your glass so that it\u00b4s around a fifty fifty mix with the mixer.\u00a0 Thus meaning that the following drink is incredibly strong.\u00a0 As Mum and Dad had coffee I decided it was a good idea to have a digestif and opted for a rum and coke.\u00a0 So, nicely full and slightly sozzled Mum and I chatted on the terrace before heading to bed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Where we had camped was relatively close to Baquedano and we continued on the road into the town.\u00a0 In the town itself there was a small museum which contained a really fascinating collection of antiquities.\u00a0 I don\u00b4t really know how to describe it actually, there were things collected from the old mine houses with row […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=154"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zelmastrip.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}